Employment at Dorset Innovation Park has grown by 125 full-time jobs over the past year, Dorset Council has reported, as plans advance for a new engineering and defence skills centre at the site near Wool.

Dorset Innovation Park Ltd, set up to manage the county's only Enterprise Zone, took over full management of the park in July 2026. It says the jobs growth came largely through business expansion and investment that the company and Dorset Council, which owns the park, have helped to support.

A new skills centre for defence and engineering

Plans are advancing for a new Advanced Engineering and Defence Skills Centre at the park, being developed with Yeovil College and Dorset Council. Yeovil College is proposing around £2.4 million of Defence Technical Excellence College capital investment towards the facility, alongside further investment of around £800,000 in specialist engineering and defence equipment, subject to approval by the Department for Education and the Ministry of Defence.

The park is home to more than 800 full-time jobs, with an aim to create another 300 by 2030. It focuses on defence, security and autonomous technologies, and its BattleLab facility, provided with the Ministry of Defence, is accredited by NATO for test and evaluation work.

Drone corridor and autonomy plans

The innovation park and Dorset Council are also partners in a project seeking to create a Global Autonomy Cluster, including a proposed drone corridor linking the park with Portland. Businesses at the park and across the surrounding region are preparing a capital funding request for a Multi Domain Autonomy Command and Control Centre within the programme.

The park's growth comes as Dorset Council buys a further 15 acres of employment land next to the site, as it looks to attract further investment and employers to the Enterprise Zone.